Supporters of a City ordinance to fund the Office of Ethics, Compliance and Oversight used their public hearing opportunity Tuesday to endorse the bill and the Ethics Commission’s appointment of Carla Miller.
More than a dozen people turned out to speak in support of the measure sponsored by Council member Clay Yarborough and co-sponsored by nine other members.
It would appropriate $142,509 from an Office of General Counsel account to the compliance and oversight office, which was added to the City’s Charter to replace the former office for the 2011-12 fiscal year, but has yet to be funded.
Among the public speakers was Mike Boyle, a former Nassau County commissioner and FBI agent who spoke about experiences with instituting an ethics office in Miami-Dade County.
He said that inspector general office was thought to be unnecessary but in 10 years has resulted in $122 million in fraud findings.
“It has to be independent,” Boyle said. “It should not be reporting to a single individual of department.”
Others also voiced concern about the need for an independent ethics office.
“The public trust in this community has just been destroyed, crushed,” said John Nooney, not specifying a reason or event. “This would go a long way toward restoring that public trust.”
Former Ethics Commission member Helen Ludwig also spoke on behalf of the ordinance, thanking the 10 Council supporters and said she hoped it would pass “so that the Ethics Commission can begin to do what it is supposed to do.”
If approved at the committee level and brought to full Council, the ordinance would require 10 votes if all 19 Council members were present.
The Council Rules and Finance committees will take up the bill Monday and Tuesday, respectively.
Other news from Tuesday’s Council meeting:
• An ordinance to appropriate $75,000 to build a dog park at Ed Austin Regional Park was postponed until March 13. The measure has generated backlash from some members of the public and a couple of Council members, Matt Schellenberg and John Crescimbeni, who voted against it at the committee level.
• The appointment of Karim Kurji, Brown’s chief of fleet management, was approved.
• An emergency resolution requesting and urging Jacksonville Jaguars owner Shahid Khan, the team and the NFL to schedule the team in international games for the purpose of marketing the port and business opportunities was introduced and approved. Khan spoke about being Jacksonville’s “No. 1 salesman” at the recent JAXUSA Partnership luncheon.
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